Loosing the Tongue

 DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO LUKE

 LOOSING THE TONGUE

Luke 1:57-66

57 When it was time for Elizabeth to have her baby, she gave birth to a son. 58 Her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown her great mercy, and they shared her joy. 59 On the eighth day they came to circumcise the child, and they were going to name him after his father Zechariah, 60 but his mother spoke up and said, "No! He is to be called John." 61 They said to her, "There is no one among your relatives who has that name." 62 Then they made signs to his father, to find out what he would like to name the child. 63 He asked for a writing tablet, and to everyone's astonishment he wrote, "His name is John." 64 Immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue was loosed, and he began to speak, praising God. 65 The neighbors were all filled with awe, and throughout the hill country of Judea people were talking about all these things. 66 Everyone who heard this wondered about it, asking, "What then is this child going to be?" For the Lord's hand was with him.

NIV

Seeing all the friends and family sharing the joy Elizabeth had, and how that applies to our lives today, we are looking into the rest of the narrative. We do not know who it was that intended to name the newborn son on the eighth day when he was circumcised in accordance with the law given to Abraham. Why would someone other than the parents get to name the child? We find that among the Jews it was common to name the firstborn son, at the time of circumcision, after his father. We should note that this act of circumcision does not have any bearing on the salvation of the child. We understand why Paul makes the point the circumcision of the flesh does not make a person a Jew, or what we would say, a chosen people, but that it is when God circumcises our hearts, that makes us His chosen people. Nevertheless, at the time of naming the firstborn son, Elizabeth spoke up and said the child’s name is to be John. Although nothing is said about this, it would be uncommon for the mother to have any say in the naming of her son. It does seem the priests that were performing the circumcision were not uncomfortable that Elizabeth spoke up,  but did, in some sense, rebuke her by telling her that no one in their family had that name, so they motioned to the father, He wrote on a tablet, "his name is to be John". Here is where the narrative brings it home for us. Look at the astonishment of all the people who were there when Zachariah wrote, he is to be called John, and as soon as he obeyed the word of the Lord his mouth was opened and the first thing, he did was praise God, and of course, everyone was in awe. Yes, this was a special occasion, the birth of John who would do great things in the name of God, and introduce the Messiah. However, what we see here is that as the first thing the father did as God opened his mouth and loosed his tongue, was to praise God. Perhaps praising God should be the main purpose of our tongue. We think of all the disciples when the Holy Spirit came upon them on the day of Pentecost and they spilled out onto the streets, praising God in many different languages. We would think that as we are also filled with the Spirit, it would be our nature to use our mouth to praise God. Still, we do have to function within our daily activities, and speak words relevant to the performance of our work. However, that also does not, in most cases, forbid us from speaking about our Lord and Savior, bringing our faith into the conversation. What puzzles us, however, is how so many Christians find so much to chatter or banter about that has nothing to do with God. Eleanor Roosevelt coined a phrase that seems to fit here. “Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people”. In the case of believers, we would think great minds discuss the things of God, the ideas are theology. That average minds in Christianity might discuss a varied number of events in the world, such as weather, sports, politics, and many other worldly events. And, of course, the small, minded believers simply spend their time gossiping. Let us use our mouth for the purpose God gave it to us, giving him all the praise and glory He deserves.